Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy attends a joint news conference with Ireland's Prime Minister Leo Varadkar at Horodetskyi House in Kyiv, Ukraine, Wednesday July 19, 2023.
A former F-16 pilot, Breedlove said there was “great benefit” for Ukraine’s forces to learn and deploy the so-called combined arms tactics that are the backbone of modern ground warfare, given that they “are going to be applicable in many different phases of what you do, no matter what.” Col. Markus Reisner, who oversees force development at Austria’s main military training academy, said that with more warplanes, Ukraine could better defend its ground troops from those attacks.
Back then, Russia had 10 times as many fighter aircraft as Ukraine — 772 to 69 — including some that were far more technologically advanced, according to the Global Firepower Index, which ranks conventional war-making capabilities. Yet in the 18 months since, both sides have relied on artillery, drones and long-range missiles to attack.
After Ukraine suffered heavy losses early in the counteroffensive by trying to follow the combined-arms approach, some commanders decided to abandon the effort and return to the tactics they know best — firing artillery and missiles to degrade Russia’s fighting capability in a war of attrition. Yet for all that air power can bring to a battle, he said, “until you get troops on the ground, and actually take it, you don’t own it. And you can’t hold it.”